Petition: Restore Mental Health Counseling at UMN CVM

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SnowJ

Small Animal and Exotics Vet
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Hi everyone! The University of Minnesota CVM announced recently that they will be cutting the mental health counseling position for veterinary students. At this time the University is planning to add mental health resilience into the curriculum and to hire a student success position to try and improve student mental health, but none of this has been done yet. We are losing our primary support without a backup plan, and without a discussion between the students and administration about how this would impact us.

Multiple student groups are petitioning the College to retain a counselling position for students and to be more transparent with wellbeing decisions concerning the student body. This includes our Student Council, Student AVMA Chapter, and Veterinarians as One Inclusive Community for Empowerment (VOICE): http://chng.it/Rm99dS6s8C
Full disclosure that I am on the VOICE board and helped with the creation of this petition (as much as I can while in clinics anyway)

If anyone has the time to sign it and spread the word, it would mean a lot to me and the rest of the vet students! Our counsellor has been a cornerstone of mental health at the CVM; she was integral for me navigating the stress of leaving a very toxic job and eventually seeking therapy that I desperately needed, and I know a lot of students have felt the same. Any amount of support is appreciated!
 
Really big yikes. My school just hired another CVM embedded therapist because of the increasing demand, and it's still not enough! This is a really bad move for UMN - I signed the petition and am hoping for the best. These types of services are absolutely essential - for ANYONE - but especially for us in the veterinary profession. Good luck and let us know how else we might be able to help.
 
This decision is bananas. Seriously, I'm really curious what the thought process was behind this.

I'm guessing it was above CVM and something decided by the university - at least, that's what my school has blamed their poor decisions on, lol
 
This decision is bananas. Seriously, I'm really curious what the thought process was behind this.
I'm guessing it was above CVM and something decided by the university - at least, that's what my school has blamed their poor decisions on, lol
So far what we've heard is that they want to shift to a focus on prevention, so adding training on mental health skills to the program and a student success director. However neither of those things are even past the planning phase yet.
For anyone who 'still need counseling and mental health support' we have to go through the greater university, which requires going to the other campus and is honestly a massive hassle. Not to mention the specialized support we have now is invaluable; not having to explain my high workload + debt/income ratio im facing +/- imposter syndrome every time I see someone is such a relief.
I'm guessing it was above CVM and something decided by the university - at least, that's what my school has blamed their poor decisions on, lol
This decision came from CVM administration; while it may have been in response to budget cuts (I have no idea tbh) it was very much their choice to cut the position.

Good luck and let us know how else we might be able to help.
If you don't mind sharing the petition with classmates and your student body, I'd really appreciate getting the word out as far as you can <3
 
Hi everyone! The University of Minnesota CVM announced recently that they will be cutting the mental health counseling position for veterinary students. At this time the University is planning to add mental health resilience into the curriculum and to hire a student success position to try and improve student mental health, but none of this has been done yet. We are losing our primary support without a backup plan, and without a discussion between the students and administration about how this would impact us.

Multiple student groups are petitioning the College to retain a counselling position for students and to be more transparent with wellbeing decisions concerning the student body. This includes our Student Council, Student AVMA Chapter, and Veterinarians as One Inclusive Community for Empowerment (VOICE): http://chng.it/Rm99dS6s8C
Full disclosure that I am on the VOICE board and helped with the creation of this petition (as much as I can while in clinics anyway)

If anyone has the time to sign it and spread the word, it would mean a lot to me and the rest of the vet students! Our counsellor has been a cornerstone of mental health at the CVM; she was integral for me navigating the stress of leaving a very toxic job and eventually seeking therapy that I desperately needed, and I know a lot of students have felt the same. Any amount of support is appreciated!

Hm.

What is a "student success position"?

This decision is bananas. Seriously, I'm really curious what the thought process was behind this.

I'm sure it was one or a combination of:

1) $$
2) Under-utilization
3) A supposed duplication of resources (for instance, they may argue that some of that position's role is adequately covered by health insurance or other counseling opportunities the university already provides).

Has to fit into some/all of those. *shrug*

I <personally> would like to hear the university's perspective before I'd get excited about a petition. This strikes me as one of those things that sounds really easy to get hot under the collar about and jump on a petition .... when there might actually be a decent reason for prioritizing those budget dollars elsewhere or using them in other ways to impact mental health. Maybe not, too. But it warrants understanding the issue better than only from the student perspective.
 
What is a "student success position"?
The title they proposed was 'director of student success' so I assume someone in charge of tracking student outcomes and organizing programs/training/etc to improve it? I think since they are still in planning their precise role isnt decided yet.
I <personally> would like to hear the university's perspective before I'd get excited about a petition. This strikes me as one of those things that sounds really easy to get hot under the collar about and jump on a petition .... when there might actually be a decent reason for prioritizing those budget dollars elsewhere or using them in other ways to impact mental health. Maybe not, too. But it warrants understanding the issue better than only from the student perspective.
I can provide more context that we've gotten from the CVM side. The position in question was originally a 100% hospital social worker position, working with clients to connect them with resources and to support staff. This switched to a 50/50 hospital/student position at some point. The official decision has been to remove the split position, re-hire a 100% hospital social worker, and focus on prevention on the student side. [There is a ton of hearsay about this, but it sounds like the hospital side of the position was falling behind client and staff needs] Notably there has been no mention of budget. I would understand not having the funding to have 2 social workers, one hospital and one student, but they haven't mentioned it so I can't say.

One of the things we are asking for in the petition is more transparency when it comes to changes in student wellbeing services/programs. The student body was never really talked to about the importance of our counseling services, so it feels like they've made a lot of assumptions about how important this position really is. We have never been asked how we use and value dedicated counselling; the goal of this petition is to make it clear that this matters to us and we want to be heard about it. At the very least we are hoping to have a town hall discussion with administration about wellbeing services so we can explain our needs and understand the obstacles for the college as well as the students.

The student body has only really gotten 'here is the changes we are going to make that are in the planning phase' with the mention of eliminating the split position buried at the end. The rest of the information has had to come from student groups directly asking administration for further explanation. I have a lot of classmates that did not see the position was getting cut and had no idea until we had the petition ready.
 
The title they proposed was 'director of student success' so I assume someone in charge of tracking student outcomes and organizing programs/training/etc to improve it? I think since they are still in planning their precise role isnt decided yet.

I can provide more context that we've gotten from the CVM side. The position in question was originally a 100% hospital social worker position, working with clients to connect them with resources and to support staff. This switched to a 50/50 hospital/student position at some point. The official decision has been to remove the split position, re-hire a 100% hospital social worker, and focus on prevention on the student side. [There is a ton of hearsay about this, but it sounds like the hospital side of the position was falling behind client and staff needs] Notably there has been no mention of budget. I would understand not having the funding to have 2 social workers, one hospital and one student, but they haven't mentioned it so I can't say.

One of the things we are asking for in the petition is more transparency when it comes to changes in student wellbeing services/programs. The student body was never really talked to about the importance of our counseling services, so it feels like they've made a lot of assumptions about how important this position really is. We have never been asked how we use and value dedicated counselling; the goal of this petition is to make it clear that this matters to us and we want to be heard about it. At the very least we are hoping to have a town hall discussion with administration about wellbeing services so we can explain our needs and understand the obstacles for the college as well as the students.

The student body has only really gotten 'here is the changes we are going to make that are in the planning phase' with the mention of eliminating the split position buried at the end. The rest of the information has had to come from student groups directly asking administration for further explanation. I have a lot of classmates that did not see the position was getting cut and had no idea until we had the petition ready.

I see in Facebook that the school is setting up a town hall, so I assume that's a good thing.

I'm just looking at it from a ... broader perspective. Obviously, significant attention needs to be directed to mental health. I just wonder about the effectiveness of this position versus other ways of doing it.

I'm not really sure they DO have to go ask the student body specifically how important that position was - that gets you very biased data when (for instance) 85% of the students say "Oh yeah! We love having her!" Ok... well... but if only 5% of students across the entire body are utilizing her service, that's a more important number. Right? And they already have access to <that> data. If the actual use of her services is relatively low, then it would make far more sense to look at other ways of supporting mental health in the student body.

That's crappy that they were not more transparent and forward-thinking with regards to including students. I think a better approach would be to approach the student body in a fact-finding mission "what ARE the mental health issues you face?" and then sit back and ask (including students in the discussion) "how can we use our limited resources wisely to address these as best possible while also meeting our obligations to clients of the hospital?" 🙁 It's not terribly out of line with history for them to make significant changes with little student input, unfortunately. 🙁

It would be interesting to know what the heck a "director of student success" is...... like.... what does that even mean?

I don't mean to sound like I don't agree with your concern. I very much do. I just think it might be a GOOD opportunity to look at the bigger picture and make changes that overall lead to a better outcome long-term, rather than just say "HEY! We want to keep our social worker!" Yanno?
 
I see in Facebook that the school is setting up a town hall, so I assume that's a good thing.
Yes, I am excited about that! Hopefully we can have a good discussion out of it.

I'm not really sure they DO have to go ask the student body specifically how important that position was - that gets you very biased data when (for instance) 85% of the students say "Oh yeah! We love having her!" Ok... well... but if only 5% of students across the entire body are utilizing her service, that's a more important number. Right? And they already have access to <that> data. If the actual use of her services is relatively low, then it would make far more sense to look at other ways of supporting mental health in the student body.
I hear what you are saying, and if that were laid out as a reason from the get-go I would definitely be on board with trying to find a better use of those funds. From personal experience and anecdotes this position has been pretty highly utilized, but I could be wrong of course. My main problem with this idea is that they are pulling the position before they actually have those other ways of supporting mental health. The preventative training isnt started and the new positions aren't hired yet, (and our most recent director hire took several months even ignoring covid interrupting it) so in the interim we essentially have no support at all. Granted the exact timing of when she will be leaving hasn't been laid out, but at least from the student perspective we feel pretty left in the dirt.

I really like your idea of listening to students about what mental health obstacles we face and finding a solution; if that had been the approach from the get-go this would have been a much smoother process. From our side it feels like a major cornerstone of support has been pulled away before any significant backup has even begun to be put in place. The town hall wasn't mentioned until well after the petition took off, so it definitely feels like there was no intention of hearing our concerns until it got a lot of pushback.
 
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